Home At Last
by Jessica Dawn
Summary: AU. Dean Winchester was never raised by John. Dean Winchester barely remembers his biological family.
1. Prologue

**Home At Last**

Jessica Dawn

Please Note: This is my first shot at a Supernatural fic. I'm not an inexperienced author, simply inexperienced in the genre. I've also been out of the fanfiction scene for quite some time. I hope to be able to answer any questions you guys have for me, as long as they don't ruin the plot for anybody. I have the basic outline for this story in my head, but I am writing it as I go, and filling in the details. Hopefully as we progress I can give you guys a rough idea of a schedule for when to expect the chapters to come, and hopefully I'll make a marked improvement as time goes on. If you guys feel I'm severely altering characters, I do apologize, and let me know. There may be a reason for it.

This first chapter is literally only going to be on its own for a few hours. I'm running out for a bit, and wanted to get something up to try and get some feedback to see if you guys think I should continue on with it.

And fear not. Daddy Winchester and Sammy will definitely be making later appearances.

This fic is considered a rough AU stemming right from the opening scenes in Pilot.

Thanks a lot for taking the time to read this – it means a lot to me.

---

Fire burned all around him, the heat crashing in on him and suffocating him. Any oxygen that could have entered the small boy's lungs was stolen at the last possible second by the flames that were engulfing his home. Firemen had yet to arrive on the scene, but that meant very little to him, as his bare feet pounded their way up the stairs. It wasn't the fire he was afraid of – At four, his concept of heat was a nice summer day at the beach, and he'd had no clue how hot to expect the house to be when he'd run back in. It was his father that he was more afraid of. _'Take your brother outside as fast as you can! Don't look back! NOW DEAN, GO!' _the words could only have been moments old, and he was already disobeying them. He'd taken Sammy outside; made sure he was far away from the house and put him near the mailbox at the end of the driveway, where he'd deemed it safe.

But Mommy wasn't safe. He'd seen her up there, the fire lifting her all the way to the ceiling – at least he thought that was what he'd seen. Alone, Daddy couldn't reach her, but maybe, just maybe with him, they'd be able to get her down. Mommy had to be okay too. It was supposed to be that way. Mommy and Daddy and Dean and Sammy. They were a family, and they all had to be together for everything to be okay. He was making his way down the upstairs hall when he'd heard the loud creak from above him, and before he'd even had the chance to look, one of the oak beams that supported the ceiling fell, and he was pinned to the floor, face down.

"Daddy!" He cried out, his free arm – the left – reaching up towards the nursery that he was sure his father was still in. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't shift the heavy piece of wood, and as the fire raged around him, it became harder and harder to breathe, let alone call out. His father had run past him, and he had choked on smoke rather than cried out. Daddy hadn't even looked down when he'd backpedalled from the nursery and nearly thrown himself down the stairs. Daddy thought he was outside with Sammy, and his shriek only escaped his lips as the fireball exploded from the room.

---

He bolted upright in his bed, cold sticky sweat dripping down his face, his arms, as the blankets fell from him. They were a mess about the bed, half pulled off of him, dumped mostly onto his girlfriend. She merely shifted in her sleep, blonde curls tangling themselves even more as she curled up on her side, happy for the blankets that had apparently been given to her. A small smile came to his face seeing her next to him, and he leaned over, kissing the back of her head. Jessica was a constant in his life. He'd known her almost as long as he could remember, since shortly after he arrived in Jackson, and she was all he really had left.

It was when he pulled away from the kiss that she rolled over, rubbing sleep out of her eyes with the heel of her palm, "What's up?" She asked, turning completely onto her stomach, sidled up against him in the bed. Her arm found its way over his legs, fingers expertly weaving comforting circles on his thigh.

He shrugged noncommittally, running his hands over his face. He had to get over this. These nightmares had haunted him his entire life, whether it was the Winchester home, or the Thompson home... It didn't matter which set of parents burned, simply that they did. They always did. The ones he was too young to save and the ones he was too late to save... He failed them all, and it wasn't being able to feel exactly how intense the flames were, waking up and still having the scars from his youth marring the side of his body, it was that failure that bothered him. That he wasn't good enough.

"It's okay, Dean," her voice was soft, and she shifted even more, rising until she could sit up, smooth skin snaking over his bare shoulders, that gentle squeeze, the feeling of her curls on the other side... Dean leaned into her touch, the only thing he knew anymore. The only thing he knew he _had. _"It was just a dream, you're not there. Just a dream."

It turned into a mantra while they sat there, until the point that he turned towards her, and it was no longer a matter of Jessica comforting Dean, but a matter of them comforting each other. It was easy to slip into the physical display of affection. A manner of letting her know that he was there, that he would always be there. It was a way for him to let himself know that he would never fail her. He loved her, poured the love that he had for all of his family, biological and adopted, into her.

It was easy. A physical promise that he was there for her, and he would always be there for her.

It – _This _– This was easy.


	2. Chapter 1 Reflection

Home At Last

Jessica Dawn

---

Thanks guys, really. 287 hits, 10 alerts, 3 reviews, and 2 favourites and we're only about a thousand words in. I'm really thankful for every single hit. For those that have asked on my other stories and have had me on author alert; I will be continuing Lifes Lessons, my Harry Potter fanfic. I actually have several chapters fully written. Unfortunately, they're located on my old laptop, and I need to manually remove the hard drive to get at them. I'll post a chapter with an authors note over there, but some of you are also checking this out, and I'm eternally grateful for your support.

On with the show?

---

He was used to the way his life was, the militaristic routine that he'd simply been born into. Every morning he woke up no later than 5:45 AM, folded the sheets back from his body, and rose. Whichever bed, in whichever motel, in whichever _state, _he happened to be in, was made, expertly, corners creased, sheets folded back the perfect four and a half inches. The pillows were arranged however he had found them, as some locales liked them a specific way.

Once the bed was made, he could head into the bathroom and shower, shaving while he was in there, simply because facial hair was an aspect of appearance that stood out to people. When you were an outlaw the way his entire family was (though that wasn't really saying much,) you needed to be as generic as possible.

He already had that working against him simply with his gargantuan height. His father had always chuckled when he'd been a child, so small, almost worried his son would be of a below average height for his age by the time he was a man. It had been practically overnight that his son, _his only son, _had sprung up to his full six-four frame, towering over even his old man.

But now said old man was gone, and he could only stare in the mirror, at his reflection, as though looking at it helped him think. If he were John Winchester, where the fuck would he have gone?

---

It had been so hard to leave Sam behind, to literally dump him in some no-tell motel off the I-5 in California. Fact of the matter was, signs were springing up everywhere. Yellow-Eyes was active again, and there was no chance in hell that John was going to hand-deliver his _youngest _son to the demon. Yellow-Eyes took Mary from him, and stole Dean too; he sure as hell was not getting Sam. Sam was all he had left, really. The only connection to a life he had long since left behind. All there was now was the road, himself, and a mythical gun that he wasn't even sure existed.

But the word at Ellen Harvelle's roadhouse was that if the gun existed, Daniel Elkins has it. And if Daniel Elkins has it now, he could rest assured that John Winchester would be taking it off his hands soon enough.

In the meantime, he needed to do all he could to keep Sam off his tail, and if that meant sending him on a wild-goose chase, he would do it. Fortunately, John knew there were other things that Sam would find to occupy himself. There were always hunts, and he'd trained his boy from the time he'd started complaining about monsters under the bed in how to handle them. It was no problem, not for Sam, who had had his own (not so mythical) .45 from the time he could understand the responsibility that came with it.

Sam would be fine. John had to concentrate on the task at hand, and that was Yellow-Eyes. That sonuvabitch was his to handle, and like hell was he going to drag Sam down with him.

---

_The alarm sounded._

_ Men jumped._

_ He followed suit, rushing to the truck and jumping into his gear. If he'd known where he was going, he'd've been moving much faster than he currently was, but he had no clue. This was just a call like any other, and he wasn't concerned with where it was, or who it had been, simply that somebody out there needed help, and he was trained to give it._

_ When they pulled up outside of his own childhood home, the place he'd grown up in, his heart had sunk. The whole home was engulfed in flames, and from the looks of the crowd gathered, he wouldn't know anything until much later. He wasn't thinking with his head when he rushed in through the collapsed front door, his heart pounding much stronger than any other muscle in his body._

Mom and Dad. Nine in the evening. Kitchen. Always in the kitchen.

Only not now. Now, there was just nothing.

It was too late for Dean to get his head on straight when everything had hit home. His house. In flames. His parents nowhere to be found. 

_ He'd lost them again._

_ The world spun-_

And he woke up.

---

Jess was there already, leaning over him in her worry. Curls framed his face now, though they weren't his own, her face inches from his. He had to know she was there, and this was the only way. She had to let him see her. She'd known Dean forever, and if she gave him the chance to freak out, he very surely would. If the real panic set in before she could get to him, it would take over.

"Dean? Babe, it's alright. I'm here- Not going anywhere. Here for you- Always," the words weren't rehearsed, though sometimes, she would swear they were. They were just the words he needed, and she was never sure quite when he would, but he always did. And as long as she could, she'd be there to give them.

It was the same as a few hours ago, he sat up and she curled up beside him, just there. It was all he needed, to know that she was there. She calmly let her arm fall around his shoulders, giving him that very slight squeeze, "You alright?"

"Yeah."

His reply was gruff, evidence in his voice that he'd barely gotten any sleep that night. "Maybe you should talk to somebody about these dreams. Like a professional… You have to be able to sleep," She stated nothing more than fact. With the little sleep he was managing now, he wouldn't make it through a day at work, let alone the 72 hour shifts he was frequently on call for. "Just so that you can deal with them," She assured him, noting the glance he'd chanced in her direction, the fresh tears falling from his eyes.

It was rare that she saw Dean cry; she could count the number of times in nearly twenty on her hands, and still have fingers left over. And every single time, she couldn't help but join him.

---

There was a far different scene a few hours later at the shift change. Colton thanked Dean simply, gathered up his personal belongings and left the station rather quickly. It wasn't necessarily that Dean didn't like the older man; simply that he didn't really know him. He'd been at the station for four years now, and couldn't think of anything particular about him – _that was a lie. _Dean could remember joking around about the amount of salt the man cooked with whenever it was his turn. High blood pressure, he'd always insisted. Colton had informed him that high blood pressure was the least of their worries in this line of work, and Dean couldn't find anything wrong in that statement.

Still, salt-aficionado randomness aside, Dean didn't really know the man. Could almost say he was generic. It was when Cappy had shown up he'd lit up the tiniest bit. Edward was his name, but nobody called him that. The older firefighters called him Eddie; the younger ones called him Cappy. Isaiah called him Dick, simply because the man was so hard on him. It didn't matter because he answered to anything you called him, regardless of who said what. If it didn't pain Dean even to think the word, he'd probably call him _Dad. _

In the most basic sense of the word, it was the closest thing Dean had left in the world to it. Cappy was almost a father to him when his own Dad had been alive, after he'd come to the station. Dean had known him since he'd first lived with the Thompsons, as far back as he could really remember clearly. If he really thought about it, he could remember the gruff voice from his first day with them, maybe even before then, hazy weeks of being in the hospital before that, very vague memories that he was never really sure of anymore – Time he almost didn't want to remember.

But even as the old man clapped him on the back and guided him into the kitchen for a beer, there was one thing from that old life that ceased to exist that he just knew had to.

_Sammy._


	3. Chapter 2 Chance

Home At Last

Jessica Dawn

-

Sorry for the terribly long wait guys. School, work, social life, and health have all been kicking my ass, so a break was definitely needed. Fear not though, I am definitely back, and ready to get this show on the road. Promised to update you with stats, so here goes;

1186 views  
24 Alerts (holy smokes!)  
9 reviews  
9 favourites

Again, I am so sorry that this has taken so long, I hope that some of you are still here with me for the ride.

The first time that Sam Winchester had dreamt about the blonde, he'd thought he'd been having some sort of sexual fantasy. An absolutely gorgeous woman was mere inches from his face, ringlet-y curls completely obscuring any of his peripheral vision. _'Babe, I'm here, always, here for you, not going anywhere,' _her lips had parted just so as she spoke, her beautiful tongue gliding past her teeth with certain consonant sounds, and soft vowels, perfect in every way. He'd hoped he would never wake up, entirely unsure of just how this beautiful blonde had wound up slumming it with somebody like him. Short and still carrying his baby fat. Failing math and social studies.

She seemed like she would be amazing at social studies, the way her lips caught his, and suddenly he was above her, taking control of this situation, knees straddling on either side of her, carefully keeping his weight off of her. He felt the skin on his leg pull tight, and while it should have been an entirely new sensation for him, he had the distinct feeling that this was normal, this particular brand of skin stretching too-tight over muscle.

And just as he was beginning to feel it, to really feel it, her hands were on his chest, and she was holding him at bay, _'Don't you have to get to work, baby?' _and he woke up, thirteen years old, and more than anything not wanting to report to Ms. Grundler's seventh grade classroom that he'd been in for almost a month now.

It was years until he dreamt of her again, in the middle of a weeklong stakeout in some dump of a town in Ohio. It was just an hour long power nap, yet as soon as his eyes had closed there she was, beautiful blue eyes sparkling at him from the passengers' seat of a seemingly ordinary car. He was driving, a rarity in his world, as his father had always insisted on driving himself, but the pedal felt natural under the weight of his foot, as if there was some kind of groove there that the weight of his boot had long since imprinted. He smiled at her, and she turned, rolling down the window, _'Are you sure you can stop training for a road trip to California?' _she'd asked, though there wasn't a hint of disappointment in her voice.

He shrugged, paying attention to the road, _'I need a break, Jessica,' _the voice was foreign, yet familiar, and now his mystery perfect girl had a name. It fit her beautifully, and he couldn't imagine her having any other name that would fit. _'This is all too much right now. Just a few days off.' _He wished it were as easy as hopping into a car with her and leaving. Perfect Jessica with her perfect hair and lips, and that mole between her eyebrows that just fit, and made her special.

He really knew nothing about her, and had the feeling that he'd known her his entire life. **Of course you have, idiot, she's a fantasy. What are you, twelve? **

Well wasn't that a buzzkill?

'_Marry me, Jessica,' _the words fall easily from his lips. There is no ring in his hand for her, and there is really nothing special about the occasion. There's something in him that tells him this is home, but that can't be right, because Sam Winchester does not know that feeling. There is a tv, a small coffee table that appears to be little more than a slab of wood nailed to an old crate, and a couch that he can't quite call comfortable, and for him, that's saying quite a lot.

She smiles, but it's a sad one, looking down to her lap, _'Don't you think this is bad timing?' _and when isn't it bad timing in his life? He can't believe he was stupid enough to ask her, and he feels about an inch and a half tall. There's nothing left for him. Nobody else but her. _'Just wait, okay? I promise, I'll say yes when it's the right time for us.'_

He believes her, beyond a shadow of a doubt.

He never asked her again, mainly because he'd gone another three years without dreaming of her, but this time is far different from the others. He's nowhere near her when it starts, can literally feel the two and a quarter miles between the two of them, wherever they are. He's reading a newspaper, not really paying attention to any of the things he ought to, or how his fries should be damn salty, but they aren't. The newspaper is dated November second, but there is still a part of him that knows that September is just coming to a close. This doesn't feel the way it should.

An alarm sounds, and as though he'd done it a hundred times before, he drops everything he's doing and runs. He's sliding down a pole in a heartbeat; which is saying something near miraculous with the way his heart is racing, and he's jumping into a pair of boots that he realizes ought to be too small for his own feet, pulling up a pair of heavy overalls – fire-retardant, he thinks. In his fantasy, he's a firefighter.

It doesn't surprise him that his mind does this to him. A fire was what started everything, after all.

His fingers fumble with the buttons that should be done up over the zipper to his coat, and somebody distantly is saying that he should stay behind. Of course, he isn't about to be left behind again, whether it's by his father or anybody else, so he gets into the truck, pulling his helmet on.

Before he knows it, they're on the road, and everything is a blur of flashing lights, and speeding fire trucks, and sirens.

His heart sinks, that feeling of home coming back to him. He's stunned for a split second before he races foolishly into the house, all of the training he's ever had to do with fires going right out the window. It's _his _house that is ablaze, and there is nothing he feels he can do, other than save _her. _Perfect Jessica is in there, he can feel that they're so close, but it's practically killing him to search his house, safe in his fire gear while she's...

He knows to go to the bedroom because she would have been in there. Somehow, this is the one room not touched by flames. He knows to look up, but doesn't think to keep the protective mask over his face, lowering it so that he can see her more clearly. _'Jessica,' _he near breathes, climbing onto the bed to reach her, to pull her down, even though he doesn't know how it is she's hanging there, above his head. She's bleeding, and for a moment he wonders if somebody has literally crucified her on the support beams, just on the other side of the drywall that composes the ceiling.

Just as his fingers brush against her collarbone the flames lash out, engulfing the ceiling, engulfing her.

_'JESSICA!' _he yells, plastered to the mattress by the shock of heat surrounding him. He stands again, scrambling to pull her down. Her perfect skin is sizzling off, hair burning away and leaving it's acrid stink behind. Her perfect lips have dropped open in a perfect circle, and no matter what he does, she stays on the ceiling.

What throws him off is that there are arms around him, ripping him from the room, stealing him out through the back door, dragging him across the backyard as though he were a doll, and all he can do is scream for Jessica, scrambling to pull away from whichever of his coworkers is pulling him from the blaze.

_'She's gone Dean, you can't save her,' _it sounds as though somebody is manipulating his own voice, but his name isn't Dean, and he wouldn't think that name. He would only think brother.

What completely shatters this world he's been part of for the better part of a decade is that when he finally does turn to look at the person who stole him from her, he swears he's staring at himself.

But he doesn't know who the fuck that is.

So what did you think? Short, I know, but I like it. As always, it is unbeta-ed, so I own all of my mistakes. I promise not to make you wait nearly six months for another update. Please review, I do try and answer all of them via PM.


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